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Akin clinging to his Senate bid

08/20/12 04:58 PMUpdated 08/07/13 08:15 AM

Akin clinging to his Senate bid

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After saying that “the female body has ways” to “shut down” pregnancies caused by “legitimate rape,” Republican Todd Akin’s U.S. Senate bid Missouri isn’t in good shape. The National Republican Senatorial Committee has told Akin he’ll get no support for his race from the national party, and Karl Rove’s attack operation has said it’ll give up on Missouri, too.

Akin, however, says he’s staying in the race. In fact, he’s even trying to defend his unique understanding of science – the RNC called Akin’s perspective “biologically stupid” – by telling Sean Hannity that he’d “heard from medical reports that rape is such a traumatic type of thing that there’s a reaction.”

He later invoked 9/11 to explain his pro-life views, saying the first responders didn’t ask for identification of those they saved because all lives are important.

“They don’t check their ID to see whether they’re important or not, they just take them to safety and run back for more,” he said. “They, by their lives, speak as Americans of what we think about the value of human beings and how much respect we hold people with.”

Hmm. So, Akin thinks rape victims rarely get pregnant, and when they do, women have special powers to “shut down” unwanted pregnancies without an abortion, but people should stop criticizing his stupidity because 9/11, 9/11, 9/11. No, that doesn’t seem desperate at all.

Incidentally, at the risk of taking Akin’s metaphor too literally, are women exercising their constitutionally-protected reproductive rights supposed to be terrorists in the 9/11 comparison?

For what it’s worth, Akin is not without allies – the religious right seems to be quickly rallying behind the right-wing candidate’s campaign, urging him to stay in the race.